Wednesday, April 18, 2018

Copy & Paste Intro: One thing we at Raised by Gypsies love is a good deal. Deathwish Inc. offered up ten compact discs for ten dollars and I could't help but jump on it. I have received promos from Deathwish Inc. in the past, but between moving and just life in general I'm not sure how many I still have- the only CD I can tell you I still have for certain is by The Dedication. So take a trip with me, shall you, as I explore ten compact discs for ten dollars.

For some reason I thought this band was called "Cold War Kids", which is an actual band as it turns out. Nope. And they're not even "Cool World" like that movie. Ah well. Cold World has a unique take on hardcore music. At its roots, it has the same type of in your face brand of hardcore as a band like Shut Down or Bane. Outside of that though... I'm not sure what to make of Cold World. As this CD begins and ends it has hip hop beats the name "Cold World" repeated like "Cold, Cold World" and the such. These hip hop aspects appear throughout the album as well, which only reminds of me bands like Skarhead and E Town Concrete. Other times, there are pieces of metal patched in which sound like Motorhead or Tool. The placement of it all is kind of strange to me, but in some ways it works. I mean, I'm not opposed to the people talking over beats in between songs but sometimes the way this can shift from sounding like Strife to Tool is a bit odd.

On the song "Whagman" there is this airhorn and then someone starts singing- as per the credits it is Warrior Queen- and it turns into a reggae jam. I'm not saying hardcore kids don't listen to reggae but hearing the two together feels weird. Perhaps it even feels weirder because these two styles seem as if they would clash more than the hardcore and metal I previously heard but the hardcore into reggae on this song felt much more natural. A weird electronic type of singing skip comes out in the next song and this album is just not your typical hardcore and not your typical anything.

This album is from 2008 and they followed it up with "How The Gods Chill" in 2014. In some ways I feel like I need to listen to this more for it to grow on me. Maybe it's just a matter of time. But then I feel like maybe I'm a hardcore purist and I don't like other things mixed in with it, like how I could never get into Folly. I'm going to listen to their second album which is hopeful but I'm not sure this is what anyone expected the first time they listened to this one.